My alarm went off at 05:05 and it took me a minute to figure out what was going on, since I hadn’t heard an alarm clock for a few weeks. I padded out of my room and there were Jess and Hugh getting ready to leave the boat. Hugh finished packing, then Jess unpacked his shoes and socks (“Hugh, do you want to wear shoes on the airplane?”) and put them in his pack so he had them ready to go. Hugh pumped up the dinghy, we gave them last minute instructions on what to avoid and off they went. I tracked them into the marina and then headed off to bed. Jess decided to accompany Hugh to the airport and then grab a cab back to the NAOK marina.
I was back in slumber-land when Marina woke me up saying that she can’t text Jess, so could I remind her of the name of the Hotel she needed to get a ride back from the Airport to. Jess’ text back to me was “Yeah I know … I just don’t know how to catch a taxi … there’s a long line of cars but nobody in them”. I suggested she knock on a window as it was likely that they were just sleeping in their cars at 05:30. I heard her get back on board around … I have no idea what time, who am I kidding, and fell back asleep.
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| Sunrise as Jessie got back on board. |
The rough plan today is to head over to Gouvia Marina for a night tied up tight as the weather is going to get windy, do some boat maintenance and gardiennage (fancy euro-word for boat cleaning) and maybe try to get off the boat for a day or two of something else, to help Jess adjust to being alone with her parents for the next couple of weeks. 😳 We pulled up anchor about 0900 and did the slow tour to Gouvia. Wind was already up to about 10 knots as we entered the marina. Nothing to the seasoned crew of Tara. Ha ... complacency set in. The nose was getting blown right and Jess did a great job with the roving fender and I was watching Marina haul on with the laid mooring while the boat is nearly touching at the back. The fender is on the wrong side of the transom ... then I sucked the mooring line into the bow thruster. Go figure, something new. I reckon the Ormeggiatore felt a little sheepish as he was handling the line so he buggered off quick as a bunny as I jumped into the slightly ugly water and cut the mess away. Turns out it was a small piece that jammed into the blades of the thruster. No wraps. I showered off and we got into some serious boat cleaning, managing to use a lot of water to spray off the decks and clean most stuff off. We (Marina) vacuumed and wiped up inside, then I sat on deck for an hour while filling up the water tanks with 600 litres of very slow running drinking water -- thanks to the older British couple on the Bav 36 Serendipity for the extra 20 meters of hose we needed. Meanwhile a Kida look-alike ... not really a doppelgänger but black lab with a blaze on his chest, a little smaller than Kida but a very nice lad named Harry, happened by.
He was recently adopted by Mary-Lee ... an American, likely service person that had been in Afghanistan, Japan as well as Greece. She's living in the marina on an older 40' Beneteau that looked like it hadn't left the dock in a while. Harry was a rescue ... apparently someone abandoned him near the marina and she adopted him. He was very handsome and equally good natured. He'd be a total keeper. I cannot imagine what the owner must have ben thinking to let him go. I also think living full time on board with a 30 kilo dog would be nuts unless your boat was 30 metres long and you had a full-time cleaning staff.
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| Harry settled in the shade on his boat. |
Back to Tara ...the boat is good for another couple of weeks ... which is one of the things that we are trying to figure out ... what the heck do we do for the next couple of weeks? We have a little boat maintenance to do, and we need to do some off boat fitness so that we don't all become tubs-o-lard. We did manage to walk to the grocery store and around the marina for the first 10,000 step day in quite a while (Marina did 12,000)... 😢). After a quick swim at the pool and Greek hamburgers -- all bun and no meat -- we went back to the boat for cocktail hour .... then out for dinner at Harry's Taverna 1912 where we had a terrific waiter that was really chatty (it might have been Harry himself).
We had a nice time with him and learned a little more about Greek culture and politics. Funny, he's concerned about the Greek-Albanians, nearly a million of them that are taking the jobs of Greeks... if I could change one thing world-wide is to get humanity off the zero-sum-game thinking. The problem with jobs is not someone else taking them, is a general need for more. Making me poorer will not make you richer ... as we innovate, whether in service, product, or other value creation, that's how we all become better off. Looking for someone to blame? Waste of time and you'll miss the point. Work hard, hustle, add value. After dinner we walked back to the marina ... by the flush toilets ... one of life's 'little pleasures', and back on board Tara. The wind was still pretty strong but nowhere near the 25 or so knots we had during the afternoon. We're such a cliche... the moment we get onto the boat it's a race to get ready for bed and crash. What party animals we are.
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